Ask A Slave (Work Safe!)

[thistlechaser]

Know those historical reenactment sites? Popular destinations for school trips and family vacations? A woman who plays George Washington's slave at one site has started a web series about it.

At first I thought it would be serious -- facts about the time period and walk-throughs of her job. That would have been interesting, but what the series actually is is even better: She's collected the worst/funniest of the comments that visitors ask her and reacts to them.

This is episode one:

Unfortunately there are only three episodes so far.

What a great job something like that would be, sort of a mix of cosplaying, RPing, and educational. It would give you great practice at thinking on your feet, since you never know what sort of questions you'd get.

Comments

[teaandfailure.livejournal.com]

I heard this on NPR and I thought it was Awesome.
I was also mortified by some of the stupid questions people asked.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Gah, I know! Cringe-worthy.

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

I am laughing my head off. I'm so glad you linked this!

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Isn't it the best? I can't wait for episode 4! :D

[voidmagus.livejournal.com]

Being posted by Thistle, I half-expected the video to be a guy in leather mumbling answers to questions through a ball gag.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

I put (Work Safe!) in the subject line for just that reason! :D

[al-zorra.livejournal.com]

According to those re-enacting slavery in Williamsburg, when this began a relatively short time ago, it's exhausting, grueling and has bad emotional effects upon those playing the slaves, particularly run-aways and those being sold and so on.

Love, C.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Yeah, she mentions that element of it on her site (askaslave.com, I think -- should be on the video page). She's played all sorts of slave roles, and talks about how odd it is to then come back to reality where a black man is the president. Totally understandable.